While the Finnish ‘Six-pack’ coalition government in its new budget
continues to implement cuts and attack workers and youth, and the trade
union federations – SAK, STTK and Akava – accept a historically poor
central wage agreement. This has led to broader interest in political
alternatives in Finland. Last weekend, Sosialistinen Vaihtoehto (SV,
Socialist Alternative, CWI sympathisers in Finland) organised its first
public meeting and activities in Turku (the third largest city in
Finland) where the SV recently has been able to win new members and
sympathisers.

The meeting, which was held on Saturday, 31 August, was attended by
activists and interested people, some of whom had met the group at its
activities in the centre of the town the same morning or the night
before. Copies of the new issue of the SV paper in Finnish, also named
‘Sosialistinen Vaihtoehto’, were sold during and after the meeting. The
paper’s mix of articles on current events, history and theory received a
lot of interest amongst residents of Turku. The meeting’s topic was the
crisis in Southern Europe. The focus was on debunking the myth that the
capitalist crisis was caused by workers living beyond ‘their means’.

But the other key topic was naturally the central wage negotiations in
Finland, which ended on 30th August. SV has been campaigning against the
"zero-line" on wage increases demanded by the employers. Even though
marginal increases are included in the deal - 20 euro after four months,
followed by an additional 0.4 % after 12 months from the first increase
- it can at best be described as scandalously bad and totally in line
with the employers’ organisation, EK’s, aims.

This will serve to further deepen the economic crisis, as it will lower
the consumption power of the workers, with an estimated 0.5 % the
following year. Also, the government’s new, anti-worker budget agreement
for the next year was much discussed during the days of SV activities.

Relentless attack on council services

The 2014 budget deal foresees cuts of 2 billion euro in the
municipalities, signifying a relentless attack on the already hard hit
city council services. This is another step in the destruction and
privatisation of public services. It imposes additional cuts of 90
million euro in all kinds of state funded social services, such as
schools, polytechnics, social and health institutions and elderly care,
explained Tiago Silva, a SV-member during the public meeting in in Turku.

It also reduces the students’ benefits and unemployment benefits for
younger people. Unemployment benefits and the social welfare provisions
are going to suffer cuts of 105 million euro. Some state-owned companies
are going to be privatized and ‘consumption taxes’ will be increased.
All this is done so that the rich can be presented a gift of more than 1
billion euro, with a decrease in corporate tax and also of stock-market
dividend taxation, said Tiago.

The Finnish government dances to the same tune as other governments
throughout Europe: austerity, cuts, privatizations, anti-worker
policies, and so on. With the aggravating circumstance that, in Finland,
the traditional political parties regarded as on the ‘Left’ (the social
democratic SDP and the Left Alliance (ex-communist party)) participate
in the neo-liberal assault, leaving the workers without a political
alternative. Hence the necessity of building a strong socialist working
class alternative to overcome the crisis, concluded comrade Tiago Silva
at the successful Sosialistinen Vaihtoehto public meeting in Turku.